Donald Trump song in race for Christmas number one

FRANK URQUHART

The soundtrack to “Donald Trump does Bohemian Rhapsody” - a satirical protest video produced to highlight the bitter dispute between the business tycoon and the residents of Aberdeenshire’s Menie estate - is being released as single in the battle to become the Festive Season number one.

The parody of Queen’s seminal hit was first featured last year in a protest video, produced by a group of Scottish poets, musicians and artists to highlight the plight of the residents who had been facing potential eviction to pave the way for Trump’s £750 million golf resort on the Menie estate.

Brian May, Queen’s lead guitarist, gave his blessing to the video, featuring a Spitting Image style puppet of the American billionaire, declaring: “I can see there is a horrible example here of bullying the defenceless by a rich man who apparently can buy anything he wants.”

Hazel Cameron, the Edinburgh-based poet who helped to produce the video, said the soundtrack was now being released in time for the Christmas singles market to highlight the campaign by David Milne, one of the Menie estate residents at the centre of the controversy, who is calling for a full public inquiry into the dealings between the billionaire and Scottish authorities.

Ms Cameron said: “We want to get the video back in the mainstream again and to bring more attention to what has happened. The recent screening of the documentary ‘You’ve Been Trumped’ on BBC2 aroused a lot of anger and we want to keep building on that and put the pressure on for this inquiry and to get people looking into what exactly has gone on.

“The Menie residents continue to fight the intimidation of having earth piles surrounding their homes and trees planted to obscure their views.”

She continued: “The video had a fantastic reaction. Initially, when it went up online we had 25,000 views in three days but it was taken down after EMI claimed it didn’t have copyright. That really killed the impact. By the time we had proved it wasn’t illegal the damage had been done. But Brian May did load up the video on to his own website.”

“Donald Trump does Bohemian Rhapsody” by Dmytro Morykit and Francis Wright, is available for download from today from most online stores including iTunes and Amazon. Ten per cent of the proceeds of the sales will go the protest organisation “Tripping Up Trump.”

Sarah Malone, the executive vice-president of Trump International Golf Links Scotland, declared: “This is a tired rehashed publicity stunt which further reinforces the lack of credibility of the small group of detractors behind it”

She added: “It only serves to hurt the reputation of Scotland and its people. Over 10,000 people played our course in recent months and were not manipulated or swayed by this sort of factious nonsense which has been peddled by a handful of individuals for years.”